"Santa Ana River Jetties is the most consistent spot by Newport Beach. If everywhere else looks flat, go check out River Jetties because there's almost always something out there. River Jetties is, however, extremely varied in shape and depends on the contour of the sandbars. Lefts tend to be fast and predominant during south swells and can turn really hollow on a light offshore wind. Westerly winds easily blow out the spot. In winter, the break is far peakier. Steep peaks are found on the right tide, but if you don't surf the spot regularly, the chances of a great day are slim. Because River Jetties is a fast powerful shortboard wave, you tend to get aggressive crowds. It's one of the few breaks in the city where you don't have hoards of beginners swarming the peaks due to the heavy break and strong rip currents let alone the Great White's that patrol the area."

Just like Surfline says ... when its waist high everywhere else and swamped by an early morning high tide River Jetties was nasty overhead peaks that jumped up as the backwash hit them then sucked up on the shallow sandbars in the river mouth. Paddled out with my OZ buddy fighting the strong rip current barely made it out before a set of big overhead peaks had us scratching for the horizon. Hard to drop into until the backwash hit ... then the bottom fell out! I thought I was pretty good slicing and dicing the small stuff at Seal Beach last week ... out here I got pounded! Only made a few waves, just too fast for an old guy on a longboard. The shortboarders were getting some really narly sand grained tubes.